#there are so many layers of meaning. it's a line that just resonates with me so much.

[x-uno]

Hey! Do you think you could make a OPLA!Zoro x reader but like fluff to angst something like that?? You can do whatever you want be creative :) thank you! XOXO

Silent Longing.

Pairing: OPLA!zoro x reader

| 𝙼𝙰𝚂𝚃𝙴𝚁𝙻𝙸𝚂𝚃

In the quiet corners of our hearts, there often exists a hidden treasure, a secret admiration that we dare not speak aloud. It's a tale told in hushed tones, a whisper to the universe, a confession to no one but ourselves.

"You have to stop being stupid and risking your life, Y/N," Zoro grumbled, his gruff voice cutting through the stillness of the night. "You're lucky I saved your ass in time."

His words, though laced with irritation, were a stark reminder of the genuine worry he held for your well-being. 

You couldn't help but smile, a mix of gratitude and longing in your eyes as you met his gaze. "I guess I owe you one, Zoro."

He shifted uncomfortably, the weight of your words sinking in. "Just don't make a habit out of it. We need every hand on deck."

A wry smile tugged at your lips as you leaned against the railing of the Going Merry, gazing at the starry sky that stretched endlessly before you. "Heh, worried about me?"

Zoro, who had been standing nearby, turned his head away, his face hidden in the shadows. "Don't get the wrong idea. I'm not worried about you."

"Whatever you say, mosshead," you retorted, using the nickname you knew he secretly tolerated.

As the stars continued their silent dance overhead, you couldn't help but steal a glance at Zoro. His profile was bathed in moonlight, revealing the scars that adorned his rugged face. There was a magnetic allure to him, an irresistible enigma that had drawn you in from the moment you joined the crew.

In these moments of secret admiration, we become silent observers, watching from afar, admiring the beauty or brilliance that has captured our attention. We find ourselves drawn to qualities that resonate with our own desires and aspirations.

"You know, Zoro," you began, your voice soft, "sometimes I wonder if the Grand Line has as many mysteries as you do."

Zoro's eyes, ever watchful, shifted in your direction. "What's that supposed to mean?"

You shrugged, your gaze returning to the stars. "Just that you're a man of many layers, and I feel like there's so much about you I don't know."

A hint of a smirk played at the corner of Zoro's lips, though he still avoided making direct eye contact. "You think you can figure me out, Y/N?"

You chuckled, your heart feeling oddly light in this moment of vulnerability. "I don't know, Zoro. But I'd sure like to try."

In the days that followed, your interactions with Zoro remained a delicate dance of unspoken sentiments. The crew sailed through uncharted waters, facing perilous challenges and ferocious adversaries, yet the magnetic pull between you and the swordsman remained a constant presence.

There were moments when Zoro would surprise you, whether it was offering a hand to steady you on a rocky path or sharing a rare smile when no one else was looking. Those moments became the source of both your greatest hope and deepest despair.

"Y/N, watch your step," Zoro's voice broke through the tension in the air as you navigate the treacherous, narrow ledge on a seemingly endless mountain path. His strong hand reached out, fingers grazing your arm gently to ensure your balance.

You couldn't help but glance at him, your heart pounding in your chest. "Thank you, Zoro."

His gaze met yours for a fraction of a second before he turned away, his expression unreadable. "Don't mention it."

The ambiguity of his actions gnawed at your soul like a relentless storm. Did he see you as nothing more than a comrade? Or was there a chance, however slim, that he felt something deeper?

In the quiet of your own thoughts, you replayed those instances, dissecting each one for hidden meaning. But in the end, you couldn't escape the truth that hung over your heart like a storm cloud: Zoro's actions, no matter how seemingly significant, remained shrouded. 

-

"Zoro, do you ever wonder what keeps us going? What's the point of it all?"

"We have our goals. We chase them. That's all."

"But what about... other dreams? What if there's something or someone you care about more?"

He didn't answer right away, and you could feel the weight of unspoken words hanging in the air. When he finally spoke, his voice was like a blade, cutting through the silence.

"Dreams like that are for fools, Y/N. They lead to nothing but pain."

''Oh.''

But, of course, it was an inevitable truth that in the depths of our souls, unrequited love resided, an agonizing ache we concealed beneath stoic masks.. It's a silent longing that beats like a quiet drum, an unspoken declaration that remains locked within.

A  bittersweet melody that plays in the chambers of our hearts. We yearn for the love we give to be mirrored back, but fate has different plans. It's an unspoken story, a love unfulfilled, a heart that beats out of sync with the world.

 "But isn't pain a part of life, Zoro? It's what makes us feel alive, isn't it?"

Zoro clenched his jaw, frustration evident in his tense posture. "Feeling alive, huh? That's overrated. Life's about survival, not getting caught up in pointless emotions."

"But what if it's not pointless? What if it's what gives life meaning?"

Zoro's gaze bore into yours, and for a moment, it seemed as though he was about to reveal something hidden deep within himself. "Y/N, I've seen what happens when people get too attached to their dreams, to others. They lose focus. They get distracted. And then, they fall."

You felt a pang in your chest, a mixture of frustration and a growing sense of desperation. "But Zoro, isn't there something you care about? Someone you'd do anything for?"

Zoro's expression hardened, and he turned his gaze away from you. "I have my crew. They're my dream, my goal. Nothing else matters."

The silence hung heavy between you, a palpable tension that refused to dissipate. Your heart ached with the desire to break through Zoro's stoic exterior, to understand what lay beneath his tough facade.

"Zoro," You whispered, their voice barely audible, "sometimes, dreams change. Sometimes, they evolve into something more beautiful than we could have ever imagined. And sometimes, letting someone in doesn't make you weak; it makes you stronger."

Zoro's eyes flickered, a hint of vulnerability briefly surfacing before he buried it deep within. "I don't have time for distractions, Y/N. I won't let anything or anyone get in the way of my goal."

A tragedy it was, a love so profound it felt like both a blessing and a curse. To love someone with a depth that threatened to consume every fiber of your being, yet knowing that you could never truly be his was a torment that tore at the soul.

It was a love that coursed through your veins like a bittersweet poison, intoxicating your senses and clouding your judgment. Every stolen glance, every stolen moment, was a reminder of the forbidden nature of your desires. And yet, you could not help but yearn for more, to risk everything for the chance to be near them, to feel their presence like a lifeline in a world that seemed determined to keep you apart.

The very thought of  him was a constant ache, a haunting melody that played in the recesses of your mind. 

And yet, you knew that to pursue this love would be to court disaster, to dance on the precipice of ruin. The world had conspired to place insurmountable barriers between you, and the consequences of crossing those lines were too dire to contemplate.

So, you loved him in silence.

taglist: reply to be added !

© 2023 x-uno ── all rights reserved. do not copy, translate, edit, alter, or redistribute my work. 

#one piece x reader #one piece #one piece live action #roronoa zoro #zoro roronoa x reader #opla zoro x reader #angst #fluff #ahhhhh #sobbing

[inbarfink]

I mean, the thing that’s really amazing to me about the Rocky Horror Cult Phenomena is how much it fits with the themes of RHS. Like, Rocky Horror becoming The Midnight Movie and gaining this huge culture of callbacks and cosplay around it wasn’t like something anyone planned for or anything like that - it was a super-unexpected and strage and organically-grown thing and it just amazing how well it resonates with the movie itself. So many movies gain Fandoms that are kinda at Odds with What the Movie is Actually, so it’s really incredible that even with the Rocky Horror Fandom being what it is, it’s also so in-sync with the movie it’s based around in a strange way. 

Like, if you actually wanna think seriously about RHS, there are few major lenses of interpetation you can view it through: as a 70′s-style mockery of the 50′s, as a narrative about both the anxiety and thrill that comes with the changing times, as a Garden of Eden allegory starring a weird Reverse-God whose gospel is debauchery... but I think one of the biggest ones for me is how it is obviously a tribute to the experience of watching horror and sci-fi movies late at night - and the way these movies, however silly, can offer a sort of getaway from the restrictive, repressive environment of your everyday life. 

Like that is kinda what “Science Fiction/Double Feature” is literally about?

It’s about how much the speaker wants to watch a late-night screenings of science fiction\horror movies. And the verses are peppered with all of these vaugely sexual innuendos, it’s clear that this is at least part of why the speaker wants to go to the late night double feature picture show. Whatever it’s because sci-fi outfits allow for a bit more fanservice than your Regular Movies (”And Flash Gordon was there/In silver underwear”), or cause the thrills of the monsters can become strangely sexual (”And I really got hot\When I saw Janette Scott\Fight a Triffid that spits poison and kills”) or just for some midnight alone-time in the back row...

And in the stage version that line is usually sung by an Usherette character which kinda makes it like... it puts another layer of reality between the audience and the plot. Like, what is seen on stage isn’t a musical abstraction of Brad and Janet’s misadventure but a musical abstraction of the experience of the Usherette (and the cinema audience played by the Actual Audience) watching a horror movie starring Brad and Janet. In the Picture Show, this is replaced with just like... a lot of intentionally kitchy transitions and editing tricks to constantly remind the audience that This Is a Movie. Because regardless of the medium, Rocky Horror is in some way about the Experience of Watching Movies.

And this also comes up when the Criminologist speculates about the nature of reality - it is actually true that life is an illusion and reality is a figment of the imagination, because he is a fictional character in a movie. And Magenta’s verse in “Time Warp”

Like, I suppose literally in-universe she’s talking about her hobby of spying up on people in the castle (like she did to Janet and Rocky in ‘Touch-A-Touch-A-Touch-A-Touch Me’) but like... this is also about being The Audience? Like, the Audience watching the movie are the one who are sitting invisible in ‘another dimension’ and see everything that’s going on... and are being freed by fantasy. (and also it’s important to note that Magenta and the Usherette generally share an actress on stage, and in the Picture Show, share lips but not a voice).

I think you can very easily read Rocky Horror as being About how yeah these old horror movies are cheesy and stupid but they’re also, like, a place of escape from mainstream conservative culture, where you can allow yourself to celeberate the weird and transgressive. Even if it’s kinda bittersweet under the conditions that this transgressiveness always has to come from Monsters and Aliens, and that it was to always Obviously Be Bad, and it must be Defeated and Destroyed at the end - as both the protagonists and the audience must return to the daytime world of normalcy.

Even with Magenta kinda being the Usherette, I think the comperison between Brad and Janet and the Audience is a bit more important. They’re the one who transition from the everyday daylight world of social norms into the late-night world of transgression and release that is Frank’s Fantastic FuckCastle. I mean, that’s why they have so little agency in the plot, they are mostly just sitting back and watching the events unfold. That’s also why Brad seems to have adapted the “Dr. Frank N. Furter did nothing wrong” position by the movie’s climax (”What’s his crime?”). It’s kinda like he’s not really viewing him as a real life person within his own reality, but like a fictional villain. Which is also how Frank views himself - as we can see at the end of “I’m Going Home”. From an in-universe perspective, it seems like a delusion. but from our perspective he is 100% correct. There IS an audience of people watching that entire show unfurl and cheering for him. 

Basically yes I am saying Frank N. Furter is himself’s, Brand and Janet’s Problematic Fave

And then when Frank dies and the Servant Duo beams back to their home planet, it’s explictly not a triumphant moment. It’s not a moment of heroism or any sort of moral victory for normalcy over transgressivism. Like, Frank and Riff-Raff share a lot of the same rotten personality flaws - it’s just that Frank is confident and flamboyant about them while Riff-Raff is resentful and self-loathing. That’s part of why Columbia and Rocky had to die, to drive home the fact that Riff-Raff isn’t doing any of this out of concern for Frank’s victims or even really to go home. It’s purely about his own personal beef. And for Brad and Janet, the ending is really melancholy due to the way they have been stranded back in the ‘real world’. All of the strange characters are either dead or gone, the setting itself literally beamed off the planet. They’ve been changed by their experience, but now they’re back in this daylight world that they escaped from. Cause in the end, the Science Fiction Double Feature always ends. 

And you’ve got all of this, and then you look at Rocky Horror The Cultural  Phenomena and it’s like....... it became like the ultimate encapsulation of what it was tributing to begin with. The Rocky Horror Picture Show is THE late-night science fiction/horror movie event. Midnight Screenings carry this movie and this movie is iconic to Midnight Screenings. And it’s this place that allows you an escape from normalcy and a space to be transgressive - through shouting sexual and\or dark jokes along with everyone else in the movie theater and through being a space for experimenting with gender presentation and\or sexually provocative outfits....It really just became the extremely concentrated version of the experience it was trying to convey in the first place.

And the whole Audience Participation and Shadowcast phenomena really works to enchance the movie’s film of nonreality, which is I think Important to it. Like you know, when you’re sitting in a very rowdy movie theatre shouting profanities at the screen while a bunch of friends mimic the actors’ actions with a few cardboard props because they’ve seen the movie so many times they know them by heart - the murder and the cannibalism seems more and more unreal by emphasizing how much it’s Performance. But “Don’t Dream It, Be It” - already an in-universe Performance by the one character who knows there’s an Audience, feels just as real as ever. 

And it just, it FITS SO WELL TOGETHER, it’s amazing none of this was intentional or even predicted. It’s really just beautifully poetic that this fandom happened.

#rocky horror picture show #rocky horror show #rocky horror

[vivelarevolution13]

hi, your fic “moving like a river of trouble crossing” kinda resonated with my soul and maybe even changed my life just a little bit, and i thought you deserved a better comment than my inarticulate ranting in the reblog tags yesterday.

the idea of shield hiring a therapist that looks like an older version of steve’s mother is unbelievably fucked up. the psychological warfare at play there is insane. and i love the parallel drawn to him first waking up from the ice and them trying to play this trick on him. he’s so much smarter than they give him credit for, everyone’s constantly underestimating him. i think that’s my favorite theme throughout this story; everyone is commodifying him in their own way, trying to stuff him in the box that they already made for him inside their heads.

the phrase “are you awake yet?” repeating over and over is so many different kinds of powerful. firstly, the way that it ties back to him waking up from the ice and his feelings of displacement in the world. secondly, that hazy, detached feeling that comes with depression, like you’re half-sleepwalking through your entire life, and no matter how hard you try to snap out of it and wake up, you can’t. i know that feeling well, and it emanates viscerally from this entire story. thirdly, it feels like a metaphor for the fact that he’s just drifting through life, doing what he’s told, following orders because he doesn’t know what else he’s supposed to do with himself.

obsessed with lina’s comment of “wrong place, wrong time” after the date. she’s right on so many levels, more right than she knows. each and every line of this story has so many layers, all of the characters feel three-dimensional, and the vibe is distinct and consistent.

the entire section following “pain, steve knows on an intimate level,” him cataloguing all of the hurt throughout his life, is a masterpiece. this story belongs in a museum. long sections of introspection like that are always hardest for me to write, and this is like poetry. i was searching for a handful of favorite lines to pick out to quote back at you but i can’t even pick.

all the symbolism in the movie that he’s watching (is this a real movie that you’re quoting from? if so that makes it so much better) tying into his memories of his mom dying, of becca and peggy and bucky and the line “steve was only ever as strong as the people propping him up.” 😭😭😭 i have no words for how deeply i can feel his pain and loss. he’s sitting there thinking about how he was never really alone when he was lonely back then, but now he is really alone, and there’s nothing to soothe the ache in his soul.

Rumlow communicating through riddles and insults and violence is everything to me. this actually may be my favorite iteration of him that i’ve ever read; he almost mirrors natasha in the way that he says everything but what he really means, pushing limits and pushing into people’s lives like a creeping vine. pushing himself right into steve’s space, nearly pushing steve over the edge.

i’m picking up on some desperate, hopeless undertones of the little scene with steve riding his motorcycle, risking his life senselessly just to feel something, trying to convince himself he’s grateful for this second chance at life. there’s so much powerful character development in such a short scene, this is masterful.

the way that the fight between steve and rumlow is practically a proxy for intimacy is everything i love about their dynamic in one scene. the way that rumlow talks shit snd fights dirty and likes hurting steve just a little more than is strictly necessary. i know despite everything, rumlow’s gonna be thinking about this night for a long time. steve’s just a sadist’s dream, mind and body designed specifically to take brutality, and he has enough guilt and self-hatred built up to put himself in situations like this for the sake of blowing off steam. they’re a match made in hell, really.

this story deserves to be up there with the big names in stucky fic and i would die on that hill. i’m sorry this is so long, if there’s one thing about me it’s that i love writing insanely long comments ��� but um yea i’m so glad you decided to share this with the world bc !!! it got even better on my second read-through to write this comment this morning.

Omg hi! First of all, thank you so much for the generous kind words and for the detailed message. I am always so delighted when people engage with the stuff that I post in any way whatsover, but especially when they're willing to share their impressions, so you never need to apologize for it getting long. I love talking about this stuff. (if anything, I'm just sorry I couldn't get around to responding sooner!) I'm really glad the theme of everyone's different attempts to "place" Steve came through. That might be one of my favourite conflicts when it comes to his character, actually - especially because it's very workable both in-universe (we get to see people project their personal definition of what Cap is supposed to be onto Steve in the comics over and over, as well as in the movies but to a lesser extent) and as meta, considering the wildly different interpretations different canon writers as well as parts of the fandom have voiced for years now (hell, decades) - many of which, in my personal opinion, just completely ignore his background and defining traits/experiences in favor of, again, what their personal idea of what Cap (read: the USA) should value, prioritize, and represent. I just think the idea of a regular man - one with very specific life circumstances that produced a pretty rigid, strong-willed set of morals for that matter - thrown headfirst into being a myth and a propaganda tool, and by virtue of that being manhandled by the government and the public and pretty much everyone he meets almost constantly, to be very interesting. Also honestly I'll take just about any opportunity I can get to shit on intelligence agencies and all the psychological warfare (as you very aptly put it) they entail. And I love Steve's relationship with Sarah as well as that idea of everyone constantly underestimating him so this felt like a good, if painfully fucked up way to introduce that.

I could talk about my love for CATWS' nods to Steve's grief and extremely internalized way of dealing with things but I'm not going to because then we'd be here all day, so I'll just say this: I think about his whole subdued demeanor at the start of that movie coupled with those Avengers deleted scenes of him just kind of aimlessly wandering around New York looking like the epitomy of Sad Man with No Plan at least once a goddamn week. That exchange with Sam at the VA also just wrecks me every time, simply because it's so quiet and unassuming but says a lot. I'd say I'm glad my writing could get you to relate to that sense of dissociation so strongly, but having experienced it myself one too many times I'll just say it fucking sucks and I'm sorry it's so familar. Again, interesting to write about, though, especially when you're writing about a guy who's not only clearly been used to keeping this shit under lock and key his whole life, but who has only had maybe like three and a half people that he could on rare occasions allow himself to confide in, all of whom have gone and died on him or are getting there. Not to mention the survivor's guilt involved - I kept thinking that I can't imagine how badly just about anyone would react to these kinds of feelings if they were feeling guilty about being alive in the first place on top of everything else, and then guilty about feeling that way instead of grateful, like some kind of hellish positive feedback loop. Happy the "wrong place, wrong time" comment went over well! It felt a little heavy handed while I was writing it, but that may just be because I spent a good few days just overthinking that segment. That said I do have a whole background for Lina I have to figure out what to do with now, lol. I've gotten too attached. The movie he's watching is in fact real! It's called Mikey and Nicky and I can't recommend it enough to anyone who might be interested in a slightly experimental, character study-esque '70s crime flick that's really more a thoughtful story about love and death and devotion and lifelong friendship ultimately not surviving the test of time, differing life choices and disillusionment. Themes of childhood and loss and remembrance just kill me in general, especially in the scene I included, and especially because my brain kept going "haha but what if we made this about stucky" on repeat until I had to sit down at write this. Tbh that segment might be my favourite, the fact I had to take several breaks while writing bc I got too sad notwithstanding. And finally: ah, Rumlow. That motherfucker. Hate that guy's guts, love writing him. I cannot tell you how much I'm glad that Natasha parallel came through for you, because I think I did initially conceive of them as mirrors. My thinking was that Steve probably wouldn't fully trust either of them, especially in that lockdown survival mode and just having come into the whole paranoid toxic environment that is SHIELD which he already doesn't really trust, either. That said, I think on that surface level he might latch onto Rumlow more simply because he kind of highkey screams DOWN TO EARTH SOLDIER more than spy which might be more familar, and because Steve's well aware Natasha owes her allegiance to Fury in a pretty established way and is showing a personal interest in his life, which could come across as suspect. And it definitely is to an extent, but I think in the way that for Natasha at this point the slowly budding care she is developing for Steve as one of her own is still very much inseperable from her need to possess information and have control over the situation, which clashes with Steve's equally distrustful nature and desire to keep something for himself. Of course, we know that she's well-meaning and just acting on habit, while Rumlow is...well, Rumlow.

I tried to write Steve as being attracted primarily to that familiarity/comfort of having someone very competent and dogged and seemingly loyal on his side as well as Rumlow as a whole - his experience, his skill, this more level, borderline challenging approach he takes with Steve, even that rougher side to him; despite also being somewhat aware of and at moments even put off by the dubious nature of it all (not necessarily the fascist dogwhistles, but just those moments where that "just one of the guys" front crosses a line into something murkier) but eventually always ending up shutting that feeling down as dismissible because he doesn't have the energy to process it, and prob because there's a certain degree of shame coloring the whole thing. He doesn't want to think about why he's attracted to Rumlow including the violent side of him, about why he's drawing unwilling parallels to Bucky, about what he's subconsciously looking to get from Rumlow while in this self-destructive spiral, and so he inevitably just goes along with it. For Rumlow's part, I think he's definitely got that "moth to a flame" attraction to Steve, and might even respect (big, gigantic fucked up quotation marks around that) him in his own way, or at least he respects what Steve could do if he just wasn't so...well, Steve. I imagine the whole projection of Cap the Symbol (remember when I mentioned that like 2000 words ago?) as well as many of the things we all love about Steve the Man probably rub Rumlow the wrong way, if for no other reason because they're an unwittingly glaring call to his conscience, which I figure would just unnerve and piss him off more and make him turn even more punishing on instinct just to justify himself to himself. In any case, he definitely gets a kick out of being near Steve in the same way people get a kick out of proximity to powerful people in general. I don't think it's a HYDRA honeypot thing or some straight-up evil plan behind it or even a fully conscious thing for him necessarily, just that he's aware Steve's very, very strong and very, very closed off and very, very good while also being pretty fucking vulnerable, and gets a kick out of being able to exploit that and push his buttons and ultimately more or less subdue him in a way that has as much, if not more, to do with power as it does with sex and attraction. So violence as a proxy for intimacy is a perfect way of putting what I was going for, thank you for that!

What I ultimately find the most interesting about writing this version of Rumlow in relation to this version of Steve is that Rumlow is very much a hateable character to me precisely because on the surface he could be just any other alright guy, if he weren't, well.... Rumlow, if he didn't repeatedly decide to give in to the same sadistic instinct because it's easier than the rest of it, if he didn't make the same morally wrong choice over and over despite initially seeming reedemable, despite getting every opportunity to choose differently; same as Steve repeatedly chooses to be good despite his own flaws, despite the opportunity to just give up, despite his own inner turmoil.

So, y'know: very much fuck that guy. They should've dropped more than one building on him. Hell of an interesting dynamic to write, though. Match made in hell indeed.

*claps hands together* ANYWAY! JESUS CHRIST THIS GOT LONG, I'm so sorry to you and anyone seeing this. This wasn't meant to turn into my own personal verbose meta playground, and yet it did. Thank you so much again for the lovely comment and for taking the time out to come talk to me about your impressions, it's been a pleasure!<3

#asks #mandyyvibes

[astro-royale]

𖦹*ੈ‧Spiritual causes for physical ailments 𓋹🫧」₊˚.༄ °•°•°•°•°•°

°•°•°•°•°• written by

Amaryllis

🐚. 1. Everything is energy condensed

🐚. 2. But before you get to a solid state of matter, aka your physical body,there are more layers. Layers that are so light in vibration that they appear to be invisible.

BUT they are layers.. meaning the more you add on, the more there will be.

And eventually your physical body and physical reality will somehow manifest those layers because so much energy had to have been given for those layers to be formed.

Of course those can be positive or negative layers of energy, and physical ailments tend to be the accumulation of the latter.

Now the following information which I’m about to present is from Author Eileen Day Mckusick. She has written a book on the subject which I will reference at the end.

Of course there will be many perspectives on such a subject matter, but I tend to resonate with this one as I have found it to be in line with pure metaphysical truth and it is pretty straightforward.

The truth will often be simple yet hardest to apply.

🐚.3 Trauma can often cause emotional blockages

Which will then be stored in the body if they will not be Released and transmuted.

Now, everything will either be yin and Yang ☯️

Masculine or Feminine, Positive and Negative in nature

And these polarities will also manifest in our bodies , as the left and right side of our bodies and also the left and right hemispheres of our brain.

So keep in mind these polarities will represent trauma accumulated from your Mother’s side of the family as well as from your Father’s side, but also generally trauma accumulated from males or females in your life.

Some symptoms may not even be yours and they will simply be ancestral, but they will have been passed down to you because the energy was not cleared out by the previous person who accumulated it… And so the layers add up.

To you; the one who will heal the generational curses by healing yourself

So, here you are, chosen one.

I shall now reveal the information.

LEFT hemisphere: FATHER

RIGHT side of the body: FATHER

RIGHT hemisphere: MOTHER

LEFT side of the body: MOTHER

The feet:

Left- stuck in a toxic situation that we felt we couldn’t do anything about

Right- fear of moving forward

Knees: Feeling stuck

Left: holding onto the devil (interpret that how you want, im just the messenger)

Right: feeling blocked, moving forward is an issue

Hips:

Left: frustration of unmet needs. Things we want to be doing, being or having, but not doing. Body image issues. Over caretaking others.

Victimhood, unheard, frustrated

Right: Guilt driven, overthinking and overdoing, going out of your way to do things.

Anger

SOLAR PLEXUS:

Left side: Powerlessness, frozen

Left shoulder: Sadness, grief, loss

Right shoulder: Saying yes when we mean no,putting other people’s needs ahead of our own, being a caretaker and accommodator.

🐚. Even when we get into accidents or injuries it tends to be where our biofield is out of balance.

SPINE:

Upper back: carrying the burdens of the world

Mid back: martyrs,people who do everything and do too much, feeling like no one is there for you.

Lower back: intimate relationships and financial status.

🐚when our mind goes out of balance our body

Goes with it.

NOW, there are so many ways to heal what has just been mentioned. I will create more blogs where I share what has worked for me as well as what I have researched.

Take this information how it resonates and most of all trust and follow your intuition to guide you how it may to bring your mind and body peace. I hope this information was able to help those in need of it, take this a sign that everything will end up for your highest good in the end :)

Please keep in mind a lot of time and energy goes into this research :) I love being able to share it with everyone and I want to keep sharing my knowledge unconditionally which is why I haven’t created a Tumblr+.

If you wish to support me from the kindness of your heart so I can keep doing what I love and also provide you with life changing knowledge, you can leave a Tip , by clicking the Tip button in my bio. 

Or you can cashapp me £astroroyale

Thank you and much love to you all.

I covered some key points, there is definitely more to learn on this topic but here is the book in which you can find more information about this, and I will also link the author’s website.

I have also linked my channel where you can find healing meditations and healing frequency music.

#metaphysical #metaphyics #healing #self healing #healing journey #self care #gratitude #holistichealth #holisticwellness #holistic approach #energy work #masculine energy #divine masculine #divine feminine #lightworker #spirituality #spiritual awakening #the sacred feminine #feminine beauty #law of manifestation #law of abundance #law of attraction #holistic healing #manifesting miracles #manifesting #manifesation #Youtube

[princessjung]

I saw your ask on marshmallowprotection and i totally agree! I am partial to suit & se saeran being sort of brash, as much as i love how sweet the others are, i think it brings something fun to their dynamic

GE Saeran is my favourite of all but I won't deny myself some inner Suit coming out of him! That's where you really knows that he's made up of both Ray and Suit Saeran's experience and personalities despite people loving his sweeter side most times.

They really tend to forget that he can be a lil shit if he wants to lol. He can tease and torment the hell out of you while still keeping those innocent smile on his face. That's how confident he can be once he figured out what kind of man he wants to be for himself.

But if we're talking about Suit Saeran as he is, for me he's definitely the most interesting in terms of his thought process and actions throughout the game. There's just so much layers on why he did this and that or feel this and that. And I know it's easy to dismiss him as someone who's mean and angry all the time if you only look on the surface instead of trying to dive deeper into his way of thinking.

I've been there, going back and forth on what to feel about his existence until I come to realization that even he himself struggle to understand what he really want and his purpose of living.

On the other hand, SE Saeran is someone I can deeply resonate with. His entire innermost thoughts in the Secret Ending... it still breaks my heart till this day because I know exactly how it felt like to... feel the way he did. I also know that kind of thought would still linger inside him even post-SE.

Though, there's just something so inspiring about feeling like you've given up on the world but still have that teeny tiny hope within you that maybe, someday, you can finally take a deep breath and it won't hurt as much anymore. That's the kind of person I think of when I look at SE Saeran.

The way he express his care is more delicate than the rest but it doesn't mean he doesn't care. He noticed the smallest shift in everything and while he couldn't care less about most things, he did care about his brother's and your wellbeing despite the struggle on putting it on display. You just have to read between the lines to know you're among the the very few people he gives a damn about after everything he put you through. Partly out of guilt but also because you're his first friend.

Alas, I'm glad we both can appreciate all side of Saeran because they're all unique and loved in their own way!

I'm sorry this is kinda long hshsh I just can't shut the hell up when it comes to him THERE'S JUST TOO MANY LOVE INSIDE ME FOR THIS MAN. And my apologies for the grammar mistakes and all that since English isn't my first language. Feel free to share your thoughts if you like and I hope you have a nice day/night ahead!

#mystic messenger #choi saeran #se saeran #suit saeran #ge saeran

[yujo-nishimura]

The Escape - Part 20

Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4 - Part 5 - Part 6 - Part 7 - Part 8 - Part 9 - Part 10 - Part 11 - Part 12 - Part 13 - Part 14 - Part 15 - Part 16 - Part 17 - Part 18 - Part 19

Trigger warning: angst, emotional manipulation, indirect form of self harm - this chapter shows quite toxic relationship behaviors

You follow in silence, clearing your throat in anticipation. You never really think before you speak but you hope you will find the right words now. “Buggy..!” 

“Here!”, he hands you a small package from his desk, something heavy wrapped in paper. 

You are surprised, quickly grabbing the package and just looking at him in wonder. 

“Open it up!”, he urges you, his gaze on the package in your hand. 

With anticipation fluttering in your chest, you delicately unwrap the paper to reveal a stunning glass object. Its exquisite craftsmanship is immediately apparent, as the glimmering sunlight streaming through the window dances upon its surface. The smooth contours and carvings suggest that it is made of fine crystal. 

“Since we broke the other one…” “Thank you!”, you smile at him, now slightly more calm than before, him seeming to care about you after all. 

“I wanted to talk with you about going on land. I have no problem with being on the excursion team, but why are you not coming with us?” 

“I thought you would ask…”, he clears his throat and starts walking around again, you have realized he does this alot when he seems to be nervous. 

“I need to get some things done on the ship, talk with the navigator on how we continue our journey and which island to head to next…”

“But the navigator is going with us on land!”, you interrupt. 

Buggy stops, his shoulders drop and he sighs. 

“Right. He joins you guys. Well, I have many other things to plan here… I simply cannot join this time.” 

Summoning your courage, you muster the determination to confront him directly. "Are you avoiding me?" you assert, a hint of vulnerability in your voice.

Confusion flickers across his face, his voice betraying a subtle rise in pitch. "Avoiding? Me? What do you mean?" he responds, his eyes averted, definitely avoiding direct eye contact.

“You seem to be avoiding me. Are you embarrassed of what happened the other night? Are you scared the others would find out? Or that I would disobey you again..?” 

You shoot your questions upon him, the frustration of days of perplexing behavior driving your words. You struggle to comprehend what might have happened again, as Buggy's demeanor has been an ever-shifting kaleidoscope of friendliness, respect, ill manners, and even cruelty. Now, his avoidance adds another perplexing layer to the enigma. “I feel like I have a new captain every week..”, you mumble and lower your gaze. 

Buggy has stopped moving, he takes his hat off while he sits down on his chair, letting out another very tired sigh. 

“I am not avoiding you, Y/n. I just feel like we have finally entered the Grand Line, this is all I ever wanted and I am not allowed to let my focus be distracted by anything else. We are going after the One Piece. This is my utmost priority. I am the captain of this ship and everybody should always know they can rely on me.”

You feel how you clench your fist in anger. The weight of disbelief settles heavily upon your shoulders, making it difficult to accept the nonsensical situation. Hurtful words bubble up within you, ready to spill from your lips, fueled by the sting of the moment. Yet, despite the overwhelming urge to lash out, you manage to restrain yourself.

“So you think showing emotions makes you vulnerable and less of a captain?”

“Well, try to remember the moments when you showed your emotions, Y/n. Was it helpful in that situation?”

His question catches you off guard, devoid of any mocking undertones. Instead, it carries a genuine curiosity that resonates within you. Meeting his gaze directly, you find yourself confronted with a side of him that feels oddly contemptuous and reasonable, exuding an air of captain-like authority. It's a demeanor that, in this moment, you find kind of repelling. You yearn for the fiery, uncontrolled Buggy that you have grown accustomed to, the one who wears his emotions on his sleeve.

As you struggle to find an answer, your silence inadvertently speaks volumes. He simply nods in response. 

“Please, Y/n. Join the land team. You are a great fighter and an important addition to their team. I trust in your skills and knowledge. This is an order from your captain. You may leave now.” 

WIthout saying anything else he gets up, grabs his hat and opens the door for you. 

As your gaze shifts between him and the open door, a sudden impulse overtakes you. Without hesitation, you seize the glass from its paper wrapping, gripping it tightly in your hand. In an instant, you apply immense pressure, crushing the glass within your grasp.

The sensation of pain radiates through your hand, but it is swiftly eclipsed by a jolt of astonishment. Blood gushes forth from your hand, staining the floor of the Captain's Cabin in a macabre display.

Y/n!" he shouts, a tremor of fear in his voice. His eyes widen, with a mixture of shock and horror. "Why...?" he stammers, his words choked with disbelief.

"I'm sorry, Captain," you respond calmly, meeting his gaze directly. "I am injured and can unfortunately not join the land team."

#one piece #buggytheclown #one piece buggy #buggy the clown x reader #buggy x reader #buggy x you #long fanfic #nanowrimo 2023 #long reads

[judeiscariot]

could you explain the meaning/context of drugstore perfume? I know little about the band but intriguied by your post

yes omg it would be my pleasure!!

so lots of hesitant alien as an album is about hometowns, specifically feeling trapped in yours and spending all your time as a kid wanting / trying to escape. lots of hesitant alien is also really easy and natural to read through a trans lense which only adds to the escaping your hometown motif, with how many young trans people from rural areas / small towns feel like they need to get out of their town before they can really become themselves. the subject, aka the 'she' of the song is a girl who kind of embodies this (trans) feeling of wishing for an escape from your small town.

“she waits at windows” - this girl is wistfully waiting for a chance to escape. the image of a girl ‘waiting at the window' for me always brings to mind the idea of a military wife gazing out the window waiting for her deployed husband to come home. its not exactly the same in this context, since this girl isn’t waiting for someone to come back, she’s waiting to be the person who leaves, but the images are similar in a way.

“her dreams don’t show in color” - she feels so trapped in this town that she can’t even see color anymore, it’s literally draining the life out of her. she’s so held down in this place that she barely even knows her own name, which circles back around to the transfem reading of the song. the place she’s living makes it impossible for her to connect to the person she feels shes meant to be.

“and she explains how long she’s waited for / she wanted more” - as a trans or otherwise gender noncomforming kid, you often feel like you’re meant to be more than what you are, but you have no idea what exactly it is that you're supposed to be, and even less idea how to become it. you’re always waiting for something - you don’t know what, but you know you’ll know it when you see it.

“wear another girl’s evening out” - this is a pretty undeniably transfem line to me. this girl is gazing wistfully at other girls, wishing she could live in their body for a day, wear their clothes for an evening. the way the line is specifically phrased reads as if to say she wants to wear another girl's experience in the world at large.

i am definitely a firm believer in the idea that mcr’s entire discography is made infinitely more layered by treating every song like a person having a conversation with themselves, especially in songs that switch between he and she pronouns or have an ambiguous ‘she’ character. this interpretation is central to the idea of the demo lovers both being gerard, which i think makes the story so much more deeply heartbreaking and resonant. this song could be read as gerard speaking on a relationship they had with this woman, but considering the context it reads to me like the speaker is gerard at the time that they wrote the song, while the ‘she’ is a younger gerard who had yet to escape their hometown.

even down to the title of the song - ‘drugstore perfume.’ it has this element of ‘cheap’ femininity. since mcr really made it big, gerard has pretty much always been one to express femininity through performance and just generally interact with femininity outwardly in a very costume-like way. thats not to say that they were treating femininity itself like a costume though, because i feel like that has a negative / exploitative connotation and that has never been how gerard treats femininity. even at the peak of them expressing it on stage as an element of performance art, they were also wearing neutral colored eyeshadow in their daily life and growing out their hair just because it made them feel pretty. their femininity has always been an important part of them, it has never been 'just' a costume or something they used only in a 'stage-gay' context or to piss off homophobes, even if that was an element of it.

also, something mira girlgerard pointed out earlier that i hadn’t noticed until now: drugstore perfume kinda transitions into get the gang together, which makes sooo much sense when you consider what each song is about. drugstore perfume is about longing to escape your hometown, and get the gang together is about returning to it long after you finally managed to escape, reuniting with old friends (‘the gang’) and eventually remembering what made you leave in the first place. one of the most clearly transfem lines in all of hesitant alien is in get the gang together - “whatever happened to rico / you heard what happened to sly / anyway, they all call him michelle now / and he had a new baby, a little girl gemini” - the girl from drugstore perfume is returning to where she escaped from and hearing small town gossip about her, who she used to be and who she became once she left. hesitant and arguably much of mcr’s discography is autobiographical, and this line is included in that imo especially with regard to the fact that gerard’s daughter is in fact a gemini. they are two halves of a whole song, and in turn tell two halves of the story of one whole life. i really like this interpretation because i feel like it fits nicely into the whole vibe of the current tour, looking back on when times were infinitely harder and it didnt look like there was ever going to be a way out and then looking all around you and realizing you found it.

anyways im no lyric analyst and i could be reading too far into lots of this but thats just some of my thoughts on this song. i could honestly do a line by line analysis if i had the time to, its just so packed with meaning and room for interpretation. anyways everyone go stream hesitant alien by gerard way right now

#this is probably way more than u were asking for but i literally jump at any chance to overanalyze gerard's lyrics lmfao #and this isnt even like. all my thoughts on it really this is just what immediately comes to mind articulated as best as i could #but yeah i love this song so much it makes me sick. #answered #i cant even talk abt the single mothers line yet i have too much to say about it

[lovesickfolly]

QL Favorites Tag Game

I've wanted to do this one and @shortpplfedup tagged very liberally, so here we are. I tried to give some varied answers and not do all of it from the same show(s). These answers might also change depending on my mood.

Favorite Thai QL: Moonlight Chicken. A grown up queer story with layers, different generations, comments on the queer experience, and amazingly told in a gorgeous setting and with experienced, comfortable actors/pairings.

Favorite pairing: EarthMix and Jaeyoung/Sangwoo & WinTeam Actor-wise: EarthMix. Connected to my first answer, lol. They're comfortable and comforting and know what they're doing. They give strong, believable, mature performances regardless what story they're in. Moonlight Chicken and A Tale of Thousand Stars are two of only about 7 shows I've ever given 10/10 to and they are a big part of that. Character-wise: Jaeyoung/Sangwoo, Semantic Error, & WinTeam, UWMA and Between US. I had to go with two here because I like them for very similar reasons. It's the push and pull of personalities that aren't similar at all, yet the eventual realization that they blend super well and are better together than apart. Jaeyoung and Sangwoo are entertaining and funny and an exploration of what it means to be wrong about someone. (So wrong that you actually fall for the person you loathed initially.) Their story is told expertly. Meanwhile WinTeam is such a comfort to me. I think this is the first sidepairing I ever really got invested in - complete with reading fanfic before I'd even finished UWMA - and watching their story unfold in Between Us was one of the highlights of 2022 for me. They banter and fight and yet find comfort in each other. What started out as meaningless turned out to be oh so important for both their lives.

Favorite main character: Nozue, Old Fashion Cupcake. I almost went with Wen from Moonlight Chicken here, because he's good and relatable and (I am incredibly fond of Mix)... However, if I mention relatable then it has to be Nozue from OFC. I'm giving away my age here by admitting I can see myself in him. (I'm not quite that age yet, but I'm certainly not high school or university BL level...) Watching him discover himself and grow made me so happy.

Favorite side character: Milk from Choco Milk Shake. Initially I thought the premise of this show sounded ridiculous, but it turned out to be glorious and sweet and slightly painful. Just the way i like it! And obviously the cat who fell in love was my favourite one. Other faves: Tiw from My School President, RJ from My Tooth, Your Love, Sky & KaoJao from Secret Crush on You, and Tankhun from KinnPorsche.

Favorite scene in a QL: Bad Buddy. The bedroom scene where Pran finds out Pat (thinks he) has feelings for Ink. Nanon's acting still tugs at my heartstrings to this day. The quiet, pained realization in his eyes and posture. The way he hides it from Pat while tears threaten to escape because of the disappointment. You can perfectly see the hope - maybe Pat won't actually have feelings for Ink, maybe he could like Pran, maybe... - fade and make way for heartache Yeah, that will forever be one of the best.

Favorite line in a QL: Recently, the one that resonated with me the most was 'I thought you felt the same way' from La Pluie. I explained why here.

Most anticipated QL (& why): Love Upon a Time Look, I adore historical BLs - a result of me watching and loving so many cdramas - and since Bed Friend I've been 100% on board with NettJames and their chemistry. And no, not just the steamy bits. They're very good and comfortable together, have a believable tension between them, and they're just stunning people that I can't help but draw constantly. Combine this with a good story, a beautiful setting, and I already can't wait! Similarly, I am also excited about I Feel You Linger in the Air and Man Suang.

Healthiest relationship in a QL: KingUea from Bed Friend. With the exception of one scene, King was a walking green flag throughout this show. He had a lot to deal with and yet he managed incredibly well to be understanding and supportive. Both him and (especially) Uea had a lot of deep, painful issues and a lot of pressure from the outside world, yet he stayed strong and loved Uea the way he deserved to be loved even when Uea wasn't ready to let him yet. And he didn't cross any of Uea's lines! Quick nods of appreciation to WinTeam from UWMA and especially Between Us, and PluemKevin from Ghost Host, Ghost House.

Most toxic relationship in a QL: PrapaiSky, Love in the Air. I could go with TharnType or one of the KinnPorsche pairings, but honestly when I think of toxic I think of PrapaiSky. Yes, they're cute when they're actually together, but the getting there bothered me so much that I actually wrote angry posts about it. And I usually avoid talking in great length about things I dislike about shows I'm watching. It's also because TharnType and VegasPete (or even KinnPorsche and KimChay) are at least acknowledged to have toxic elements to them by their fans, whereas I've seen a lot of attempts at defending PrapaiSky. So, yeah. I could also have gone with both the pairings from Cutie Pie.

Guilty pleasure series: I Will Knock You. Is it the best series out there? No. But is it adorable and cute and something I enjoyed way more than I initially expected? Yes. (Do know that it's a BL that takes a while to actually BL. However when it does you'll adore it.)

Most underrated series: My Only 12% I thought this show was so cute and deep and it had me crying sad and happy tears. It told the story of incredibly close childhood friends who are forced apart by one of them moving abroad. When they're reunited they finally become more than just friends. Basically, 2023's favourite plotline, but done in 2022. It's also a lot deeper than it sounds. Watching one of the main characters realize he is queer and in love with his best friend was a beautiful yet torturous scene. Earth is so good and the setting was so comfortable and soft. (While telling a painful story of feeling left behind and finally recognizing your feelings.) And the pairing is adorable.

#tag game #thai bl #thai bl series #thai bl dramas #korean bl #japanese bl #taiwanese bl

[persephoneflouwers]

So I read your posts about Saturdays and I agree with your analysis, I liked them a lot, thanks for making them because I couldn't put some thoughts into words like you did. What I was going with this anon is that I don't understand why when Louis sang it live there was a sea of ​​rainbows. I'm not against it or anything, I really love everything and the different interpretations seem perfect to me. But I don't understand how they connect Saturdays with something related to the community? I ask you why you can explain me better. I thought that maybe how the melody can convey hope to you, something like "yes, we said that Saturdays take away the pain but it's not always like that, and that's fine" and as if as the song progresses everything intensifies until it reaches the boom and yell "today may not be okay, my heart may be broken, but this isn't always going to be this way either, and it's okay because I'm going to be!" I don't know if what I said is logical but it's just thoughts I had at 1:30 am hahaha sorry for bothering you, I hope you're well :))

Hi angel! How are you? Thank you for asking. Saturdays is a layered song, it’s not easy to extract the true meaning and obviously every analysis is personal and super-valid. I was surprised to see the rainbows during the song ngl! Saturdays is such a melancholic song and maybe people like to involve it during fan actions because the slow tempo and the emotional burden it carries help building an intimate moment with all the flags and colours. Personally I would choose different songs for rainbows (bigger than me would be my first choice!).

If we go a bit through the lyrics of Saturdays, they don’t stand out as very queer to me. But that’s my interpretation and I can’t really talk over how a song can resonate for other fans. There are some lines that can recall this image of belonging to a queer community. For example “I’m not supposed to be feeling dirty cheap in Silver street”. It can be read as “i’m alone (dirty cheap) in a crowd (silver street)”, like a way of saying he struggles to find his place in a community where he doesn’t feel like he belongs entirely because he’s not out? Is he acknowledging the fact that his public image doesn’t meet the community standards in a way? Idk. This feels a bit forced and too much projection imo. That’s why my interpretation of the song goes in a complete different direction.

What I find extremely interesting when it comes to Louis’s songs is how constant such themes happen to be. Of course, I don’t know what they mean to him but this consistency helps me figure out.

He mentions change/changes/changing a lot in his songs. There are songs where he says change is inevitable and others where he says nothing changes. I don’t think he is contradicting himself (possible, but I like to give things a deep meaning usually). I think he refers to changes in different ways because he’s approaching changes in different moments, situations. I will elaborate my thoughts a bit. And I’m sorry this is taking so long to reply… anyway. Let’s report how many times Louis talks about this topic in his songs:

The Greatest: time came and changed it all

Bigger Than Me: when somebody told me I would change

Saturdays: some things change

Common People: nothing’s changed

Holding Onto Heartache: the nights they changed in seasons

Change: everything has changed, but I feel the same inside.

High in California: spent my whole life just thinking I had to change

COACOAC is the epitome of things that don’t change.

I listened to walls after a loooong time and AFAIK this topic/word are not in it. There are references to changes VS something that remains the same tho. Habit, Always you etc give this idea of a person/a thing that stays when everything around is somehow changing. Surprisingly Perfect Now has the line don’t ever change, which made my heart happy cause I love PN and she didn’t deserve the treatment she got starting from Louis and from all fans too but alas.

Where I am going with this is clearly change(s) are a huge topic in Louis’ music. I know my method of analysis is too scientific but making a list of how he approaches the topic in his songs allows me to distinguish 2 big categories that I will label as “Change YES” and “Change NO” lol.

I can’t go on for ever about this, I’ll cut it short. To me, when he wants to talk about the person he is or wants to be, about his personal journey with his sexuality, inner struggles and/or inner emotional fights, his resolution is clear: he’s not changed. He embraces it and accepts it (when you know, you know in OTB / I can tell you’re the same as me in ATT / all the above mentioned examples). My point is when he speaks on his queerness experience or the perception of it, he seems pretty sure he can’t change. Just to elaborate it a bit: somebody told him he would change in BTM, meaning he hasn’t changed and we knew already because he had made it pretty clear in Change and obviously in COACOAC.

When he’s talking about daily life things, ordinary things… well shit happens and he knows it. He knows some events can happen that will change more or less you and the way you go on with your days. Events like grief, hiatus, decisions from when you were 18… do you see what I mean?

That’s a pretty safe key for me to interpret his songs actually. Of course, I may be wrong! But til now, this Change YES/NO algorithm (lol) has helped me navigate his lyrics with a clear idea in mind. My opinion might be a little biased since I associate the poetics of Saturday as a concept to the poets I’ve read before with the theory of pleasure and stuff, but it makes sense to me like this for now!

We could write a similar post about the way he drops light/dark theme too, but that’s another story.

Hope this answered your question and thank you for asking <3

#saturdays is my second child #and all the tags for saturdays #waiting to post my saturdays commentary post #i can finally write down my saturdays analysis #i will not ruin the party with my take on saturdays #saturdays analysis #saturdays by louis tomlinson #lyrics analysis #fitf lyrics

[chrkrose]

What aspects of Brienne’s character (or any other character in ASOIAF) resonates with you the most?

There are so many characters that speak to me on some level, but I go with three:

Brienne

Oh man… she’s just my favorite in every single capacity you can imagine. I know George deserves a lot of criticism, but when he gets right, he gets it. I think Brienne is the result of when you actually look at female characters as people and decides to explore what it means to be a woman, and how complex it is . The way she questions not only what it means to be feminine, but what it is to want those things, to want things you are shamed for because they are “girly” or considered weakness. Of course Brienne wanting to achieve things that are deemed unfit for women is already interesting to explore, especially in such context as the one of Westeros, but what resonates with me the most is how he didn’t fall for the stereotype of warrior woman “I’m not like other girls tm feminine stuff suck 🤮 ugh women suck 🤢”, and instead presented us with a girl who wants to be loved and to love, who wants marriage, who wants romance, and is not in any way weak or less because of it. Her strength is in her compassion, in what men and society in general consider as flaws because they are deemed inherently feminine. Someone who is so good while making tons of mistakes and having her own flaws that don’t detract from her goodness. And how she questions what it is to be ugly and why the hell do we care so much about physical appearances like this? And who said that ugly people are less deserving of anything? Who said that beauty is the most valuable trait you need to have to be treated as someone worthy of love and sex and compassion? You see, it is very important to me that Brienne is ugly, because it truly made me rethink a lot of my day to day speech and thoughts when it comes to beauty and how I approach this in real life. To have such a character be desirable and live a romantic arc, probably the best romantic arc he created in the entire story… ugh I love Brienne and what she represents.

Jaime

He has never done anything wrong in his life ever and if he did, he looked really hot while doing so and he’s also funny so I don’t get how people want to hate him for it and condemn him for it 🥰. I love Jaime for many many many things, his entire arc is fascinating, he’s so so complex and has so many layers, I honestly think he’s one of the best written characters of the saga. I also think his sense of humor really makes his chapters a delight to read. To spend entire books hearing about how bad of a guy he was, how he was a villain, tainted, dishonorable, only to have the first line of his chapter being “I’m alive and drunk on sunlight”… George can be many things, but he damn knows how to make you instantly fall in love with a character.

Nettles

I love Nettles because of obvious reasons (the underdog who gets the special dragon, the bad boy and actually survives the war and becomes a legend), she’s right up my alley in terms of arcs I enjoy. Add to that the fact that she is a black woman, and I’m sold. You never, ever, see black women getting the hero journey arc. They are never the special ones, they are never the ones who win. But she was. She is exceptional among several characters who think themselves to be the exception when they are nothing but a bunch of losers with a superiority complex. She is the exception and proves herself with everything going against her. She’s fantastic, and is the type of character that we people of color don’t have growing up, that we don’t see in fantasy stories, and she’s that much more special to me because of it.

[daymusik]

► New Song: "Venture (Album Version)"

Song 5 of 8 from my debut album "I Would Like to Introduce" --> Watch the associated music visualizer on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ccWqkch7yM ► You can listen to the album in these places: https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/daymusik/i-would-like-to-introduce-2

🐾 Gee! A lot can be said about this song, actually. However, the description was too long for YouTube so I'm going to paraphrase this paragraph: I was messing around with the harpsichord patch in FL Studio's Morphine plugin and ended up playing what you hear here myself without any piano training. There's sheet music of that part if you want it, but I'll have to figure out how to share it with everyone first. 🐾 Huh, well, that paragraph was longer than expected. Well, moving swiftly on, there are a couple of quotes in this song. One quote is by Vance Havner. "The vision must be followed by the venture. It's not enough to stare up the steps, we must step up the stairs." I think the title "Venture" came first and then I searched for quotes containing profounded statements about ventures and found this one. I don't know nor remember who Vance Havner is (or if I even spelled it correctly but it's late and I'm too lazy to look it up). The other quote, if you are not aware, is from Shia LaBeouf. It has been a few years now since his motivational video was uploaded and memed. "Just Do It" was a motivational video Shia uploaded onto YouTube and, though motivational, many people took the power behind his declaration of "just do it" and used it as the basis of many, many memes. I, for one, really admired the message being portrayed in it and wanted to include another motivational quote in this song. However, I felt no one would take it seriously if I included the particularly "meme-y" quotes and purposefully left those out, and instead supplemented with portions of his speech that... I felt resonated with me. Honestly, this song means a lot to me. As someone who struggles with inspiration and support for my musical career, I always think back to this song and think it wrong to give up after having made such an evocative stance against it. 🐾 Now, one final point. If anyone is even reading this, I will TRY to make it quick. I am still making these videos with FL Studio's ZGameEditor Visualizer (as you can see at the bottom of this description), and while it's nice to have the ability to sync various effects to specific parts of the music, some basic effects -- like the fading text effect that I called "ghost text" -- end up being much more complicated than they need to be. This video project ended up much more messy than I would have anticipated simply because I wanted to make it look nicer. When the ghost texts appear duing the "Stop. Giving. Up," part, you would think it's, like, a single text layer that I'm fading in and out and scaling, but because there is no such thing as a "simple text layer" (well, there is, but both options are horrible, which is why I started using "HUD Text" instead), the text layers don't have a scale effect, just font size, so I have to process them as their own video output and input them into an image layer (I use "HUD Image") and then scale it that way, and the text layer doesn't actually contain any text in it; the text is stored elsewhere and you access it by changing/automating the "Text Line" effect to correspond with the line the text is on where it is stored, making the speech-follow text effect I use much more intricate because I need to copy and paste each position the text line is in (which is why I gave up after the first quote, because if I don't add it to the text page, I can't have it as a text effect, but then if I decide to add in the specific text (like when he only says "step up the stairs", that's part of the full line and not on its own instances) then it changes the positions of each text line and I have to reposition the automation points individually). Oh... well, so much for a quick section. Just... I hope you enjoy the effort and detail I put into these videos because I sacrifice a lot by not using an actual video editor for these videos just so I can use one WITHIN FL Studio that allows me to sync parameters to individual instruments and sounds in the music.

🐾 Support my music production: https://daymusik.bandcamp.com https://ko-fi.com/daymusik

🐾 Where to find me: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/6N6Yxpe5ruM1Ogy52BpOzL Apple Music: https://music.apple.com/za/artist/daymusik/1556234296 Amazon Music: https://www.amazon.com/music/player/artists/B08XWM5RJ1/daymusik everywhere else: https://linktr.ee/daymusik

#furry #furryartist #furrymusician #music #electronic_music #virtual_orchestra #EDM #house_music #dance_music #uplifting_music #motivational_music #shia_labeouf #just_do_it #paws #pawpads #paw_fetish #feline #cat #caracal #male #FL_Studio #ZGameEditor_Visualizer

[daintyrusset]

I watched My Mind & Me, a documentary by and about Selena Gomez, just last night.

I honestly went through constant flashbacks because I spent almost my entire childhood watching her, idolizing her. I remember in sixth grade that I wasn’t good at English because I came from a non-English speaking country. But it occurred to me if I wanted to meet her one day, I had to be fluent in English either way. So she was my motivation to learn the language until I am standing today to write this piece.

I have adored her carefreeness, especially when portraying Alex Russo in Wizards of Waverly Place. I have loved her music, though everybody commented the technicality and such, I think her music resonated with me and music for me is about personal experience. I haven’t watched every single series or movies she appeared on, but I have noticed her habitude in acting that speaks, “Oh, that’s so her!” I used to live in the era when she had a clothing line named Dream Out Loud, and I remember wanting to purchase it one day. I have acknowledged her dedication toward charity and philanthropy since ages ago. 

Growing up, I had other matters that became my utmost priority. I still looked up on her sometimes, her illness which was a very shocking revelation, her on-off and new relationship, her new music, her cancelled tour, her acting in new projects, her new makeup brand which became tremendously viral for people not to notice, her breakdown, her in much more mature image — she has grown to be a wonderfully sexy woman. 

Watching the documentary completely shattered my heart into pieces.

It was truly raw, though I must say the duration could’ve been longer to prevent some misunderstandings. It highlighted how shitty the media and industry portrayed her, even some interviews she had to deal were completely rude. It showed her complex layers as a human being — she could be the kindest person you think, she could be mean, she could be having the worst mental breakdown, she could be nonchalant; every aspects that make her eventually, and ultimately, human.

She wanted to let go of her past, she wanted everyone to accept her as who she really is. Her succumbing to her past wasn’t only a product of the emotional abuse she had to endure, it was also due to everyone not being able to accept her current self. Her failed plans created a voice within her mind that she wouldn’t be able to move forward. The things that have happened led her to go through various mental health treatments. At the end of the day, it’s her and her mind. 

It was beautiful when she finally decided she had enough. She continued to express it through her works, and as we all know, moving on isn’t always about only going steps forward. You meet the hurdles, you stop midtrack, it’s a part of the acceptance. Everyone seems to figure it out but you, because you will be the one making the important decision.    

There are so many things I can write about, it can turn into a long essay, come to think of it. My take from this documentary is: She hasn’t changed, she just keeps developing as an individual like anybody else. I recommend you, fans or not, to watch My Mind & Me because you will find some parts that represent yourself. And it always feels nice to find something you can relate to. 

#my mind and me #selena gomez #selena gomez documentary #my mind & me #popular culture #documentary

[sparring-spirals]

imogen being drained by her rudimentary hold on her psychic abilites vs resorting to mind reading bc she just has to get answers to any question that pops in her head and she has a hard time w frustration vs relying on what causes her immense pain as her only way to trust that they're being honest even if it means risking learning something she really didn't want to vs being repeatedly told to announce herself by ppl who unknowingly don't announce themselves on the regular vs so much more

and to add onto my messy "imogen vs" ask idk if it's the right wording and this is pure projection but: the way her relationship to her powers is transpiring kinda makes me feel the same way my ocd makes me feel like idk it's very very interesting and fascinating to me. i'm not sure exactly how to put it and which exemples to give (the character limit doesn't help my rambly nature) so this is a bit of an empty ask but yeah.... anyways keep sharing your thoughts it's always interesting! take care

First of all: thank you! You take care of yourself too. :D

Secondly: Hmmmmm. Okay. Gonna be straightforward here, I'm not sure my askbox/this space is the best option/conduit for this particular ask/line of thought, if only because. I think there is something specific in this you are resonating with/prodding at that draws from you personally, that you're trying to puzzle out.

Which! Is generally a valid and fine way to engage with media and is how some excellent metas are written. I think a lot of Imogen's struggles and characterizations resonate with a variety of mental/physical struggles, and there are so many goddamn layers to read it with. (This excellent post by @mysticalspiders comes to mind).

But also, I am not you, and so I don't feel particularly confident in interpreting something that is serving as a catalyst for your thoughts, in part because I'm absolutely going to interpret it differently, which can land differently if you're drawing from a very personal place when interpreting it.

(You don't have to feel bad about it, or anything, this is also a more general PSA so folks are aware before sending in headcanons/more indulgent projections/extensive theories- not because I dislike them necessarily, but because. I take asks for me to provide Opinions Or Analysis on things.

I definitely interpret things My Way, which can be different than intended, or even a more general "I have no thoughts about this, actually", which can land unpleasantly when people are invested or personally invested in their line of thought.

So, largely to play it safe, I'm going to say here, and also more generally, that I might not engage as much with what I understand as largely indulgent/personal hcs/metas that come through my askbox).

That aside, to the first part alone, I will say that: Yeah Imogen's brain is almost certainly going through a number of tug-of-wars and damage control at all times, and it makes her a very, very fascinating character to pull apart and poke. Definitely feel you on that. 👌

#this got long sorry. i hooe this doesnt come off as rude or blasé i understand the desire to kind of put the words out and see if i/someone #can grok the right parts and pull it out. but also i definitely think some interpretations/analysis can be more indulgence/projection based #which again. is FINE. and a fun way to engage with media (although knowing how to recognize when youre doing it/recognizing the text on its #own. but thats its own thing and not fully the point here). but also those things arent necessarily the best to send out into askboxes #bc if its inherently a deeply personal interpretation. other people are probably not going to get it right. #anyway anon if you decide to write out a meta on this it would probably be very interesting and good. #probably better than me spouting off of what is inherently your brainchild. ;P #spar speaks #ask away! #logistics #im not entirely sure how to tag this one its not very imogen related sorry anon 😅 #imogen temult #VERY tangentially sorry #i probably should have waited till i felt less fried to post this but its been a while and if i left it longer i might never answer #im wiped i apologize if this is rude or doesnt make sense #like a lot of MY readings and analysis tend to be very indulgent and projectiony. even when i try to drag it under control by laying out #all the steps in my thought process. so believe me when i say that im not judging the act of analysing characters indulgently

[winterlovesong1]

Winter Rewatched Nancy Drew

Welcome to my first rewatch of my current favorite comfort show ❤️ Under the cut are my thoughts and a few insights I hope you enjoy - I’ll be going through each episode and posting these periodically with the tag winter rewatched Nancy Drew.

2x14 The Siege of the Unseen Specter

Onto my unofficial section - the unpacking of the episode title - 

We love a multi layer title here in this house and this one is no exception - it’s the isolation of Nancy and her unseen specter - this episode pushing her to the brink with her and the leech that’s attached itself to her back, making her feel more alone, and desolate, and questioning every decision and every move because it all feels wrong - it all feels like she’s going against the grain of who she is but at the same time she can’t help it - it’s like she knows the dark waters are dangerous but she swims toward them, deeper down, and can’t be stopped.

It’s the capture of opinions and biases - those unseen specters if you will - and pushing those to the brink - exposing them - showing them in the light and unequivocally saying change needs to happen.

And then it’s also George, it’s also Ace this episode, both literally inhabited by a specter - and trying to seize what is going on and how can we solve it.

Overall MVP

Nick and Nancy definitely owned this episode. And the actors respective performances were outstanding. 

Most Heartfelt Moment

I love when the unlikely pairings of this show get showcased and the George and Ace of it all just filled my heart with so much joy. Yes, Ace was inhabited by a spirit for the majority of the episode, but that hug and honest, vulnerable conversation at the end - oh my goodness. I cried. Already in an emotional state, that hug and George being open to say to her friend please just don’t tell anyone and Ace, of course, having the integrity to accept. Their friendship is something so pure - because they are sort of the outliers - they are the friend of the friend arguably. But sometimes that “friend of the friend” can be your most trusted friend - they are the ones that can be the most honest with you - and you feel comfortable being open with them because they don’t have the bias or preconceived notions that come with being your best friend.

Best Overall Line

Ok, you can guess from my writing style I love a simple, yet profound moment and this episode had so many. Scattered amongst the monologues and deep unpacking, there were quiet moments that really resonated with me.

Tamura: “I wasn’t here then.” Nick: “You’re here now.” It’s not about whether you were present in the past. It’s about the action you take in the moment, in the now. It’s also not dismissing it because you weren’t there. You’re here now. So what now?

Nick: “Please. Please, just tell us the truth.” I cried. Tunji slayed. Just the emotion - the plea - behind asking, begging for the truth. I can’t...

Nancy: “Are you ok?” Nick: “No” And then this - I cried harder. Even it’s toward the end, after the resolution, or quasi resolution because there’s really no finality to this episode, there’s just an ending, which mirrors this dialogue in a way. It’s a question and rather than your typical tied up with a ribbon answer, it’s the opposite - it’s the truth - as alluded to earlier - and it’s no, actually I’m not ok. None of this is ok. Again, crying...

Best Comedic Moment

Most of the comedy fell in the scope of Aunt Mei and while this line is funny, I also think it’s also poignant- which isn’t that life? The humorous and the serious intermingling in a concoction of wonder and truth.

“It’s not a path if it doesn’t go anywhere. It’s a hole in the ground.”

Scare Rating

I mean, with the social commentary, I’d say arguably scarier than any supernatural ghosts. 

Side Note: I love when a supernatural show can bring some weight to real life happenings - you think oh fun show with ghosts, they can’t do this...but they do - and Nancy Drew does it pretty well in my opinion - it’s still a teen show so nothings perfect, but still...

Nace Slow Burn Rating

I always watch these episodes and go “oh this is THIS episode” and this was no exception - however my second thought going into it that I want to note in this section was “ok, but where’s my Nace locked in one room episode season four?”

So, Nace are kept apart for most of the episode, but I think that makes the ending when they are briefly together, the seperated, all the more poignant. 

This episode deals with unpacking those unseen things, those ideas or notions that crawl beneath the surface and influence our behavior and our opinions. And what a strategic theme to utilize in this back half of season two, the later half of the season in a post I couldn’t lose you world, post dangling off a ledge, post seeing each other with their corresponding persons they are dating and noticing, hmm, all those intense feelings that rushed up in a heated moment of panic and fear, yeah, those are pretty real and stagnant and don’t seem to be going anywhere. So yes, let’s unpack those unseen things and really examine what’s going on.

Nancy has lost herself completely. She’s adrift and even with last episode’s I just want to know you’re ok reach out on Ace’s part, it didn’t matter, she already pre-dismissed his worry, already calculated she didn’t need his help.

No matter how much she wants it. Because she’s not really deciding here...is she...

And as the pastor says at the end of the episode, “doesn’t seem like you” - it’s just another person showing a mirror up to Nancy saying what she’s been feeling. That she’s disappeared. But how? The mystery is, she doesn’t know - why or how to return to shore.

And then we have Ace who’s working through is own identify (really what the whole season is about) and so it’s comical yes he gets inhabited by a ghost, but it’s also just another layer in the who you are saga.

So with someone who’s asking a lot of questions of himself and the other who really is searching for where she went wrong, when they come together in the end, it’s him trying to be strong, to put up a front from all the occurred in the past two episodes, and say, let’s just make this moment great, let’s smile and hold her close and maybe that will be enough.

Being here will be enough.

But then she retreats because the comfort and ease of the moment are too much, they cut against the grain on her skin and she can’t - she can’t be here with him - with her family and friends - and act like everything is ok.

Not when she feels like falling apart.

Not when every decision she makes feels like the wrong one and yet she can’t help but say yes to them all.

Not when she’d rather make one wish on her birthday and have that wish come true.

I think we are above a rating system now but for argument sake, 10/10.

Favorite Fashion Moment

If I didn’t give it to Aunt Mei’s glasses, I mean…the shame…

Also I love when Ace wears his short sleeve shirt over the long sleeve - that man’s got some fashion choices and we love it.

Missing Moment Drabble

Posted here

#winter rewatched nancy drew #nace #tv: nancy drew

[sleepbecauseineedher]

little beast analysis

Throughout human history, written media has been used as a means to express complicated thoughts, feelings, or situations. The same subject can be written about hundreds of times, but because humans are beings with complex emotions and perceptions it allows this; the rewriting of one emotion.

Authors such as Sappho, Emily Dickinson, Franz Kafka, and many more have covered the subject of longing. There is no singular way to experience this feeling, which makes it a popular subject of poetry. Richard Siken focuses on this feeling in his book of collected poems, Crush. More specifically, Siken focuses on the obsession which surrounds the feeling. As written in the foreword by Louise Glück, “For a book like this to work, it cannot deviate from obsession (lest its urgency, in being occasional, seem unconvincing). [...] The risk of obsessive material is that it may get boring, repetitious, predictable, shrill. And the triumph of Crush is that it writhes and blazes [...]”.

The poem that resonates the most, with me personally, is Little Beast. Siken perfectly illustrates with his words alone the weight of wanting. As a writer myself, I look back on where I came from and where I am now, and despite switching means of storytelling (prose to poetry), the subject has remained the same; love. Not just love, but the feeling of wanting someone that will never, can never, be yours. Richard Siken was not just the author who helped me discover and fall in love with what poetry is and what it can be, he does so in such a unique way. Little Beast was a poem I’ve always regarded highly, but my perspective switched majorly when I met someone who I could project the writing onto.

I recall a conversation with him where he asked about what I was reading. “Poetry.” I told him. I wasn’t sure he would like it, wasn’t sure he would care enough to listen. “Like the roses are red stuff?” He asked me in return. “Not quite,” I replied, and sent him a section of Little

Beast. After all, it was about him. In my mind, each and every word belonged to him, was written just for him. He didn’t get it, not in the same way I had.

Despite that, and the fact that my messages go unread, this text remains important to me. Maybe even more-so now, as the words of the poem became even more relevant now that he’s no longer a part of my life. As much as I would like to believe this poem was written for me, for him, it’s relevant to a much larger group of people.

Little Beast’s main recognition comes from users of the social media site Tumblr. User infinite-orangepeel compares the poem to Stranger Things, user sunforgrace compares it to Supernatuarl, user the-little-red-queen compares it to 911. Countless other shows, movies, and books are mentioned with this poem. The line that appears most commonly in these posts is, “Sorry about the blood in your mouth. I wish it was mine.” This line alone could be interpreted in many ways, one that sticks out is an actual act of violence. However, it doesn’t appear this was the intended message, Siken tweets, “Here’s the line in it’s section of the poem Little Beast. Does this first layer of context change your understanding / interpretation of the line?” user @meglorich replies, “i think part of the reason people interpret the line in so many different ways is that it is often seen out of the context of the entire poem in social media posts [..]” to which Siken says, “Exactly. That’s why I added the context today, to see what shifted in people’s thinking.”

Little Beast is a poem filled with complexities and it seems that Siken believes that only consuming one line of the poem loses those, which is a valid claim. When reading the line in its context the tone becomes softer, one of acceptance of the situation at hand, rather than the harsher one given from the line alone. Out of context, the line, to me, reads as a want to mean something to someone even if it’s causing them pain. In the context of the full section it reads

more as a wish for things to be better for them, even though both the subject and the narrator hurt each other.

As a poet, Siken has a tendency to be more 'secretive’ about his writing. Rarely, if ever, does he come straight out and say what the piece is about, in an interview with TinHouse he says, “I realized that if they thought poems were biographically accurate, then they could walk away, knowing I was just a sad little man. If, however, the poems were crafted and framed with intent, then they would be confronted with a piece of art. No longer able to simply pity me, these readers would have to take ownership of their feelings and reactions.”

In poetry, the reader's interpretation is important. While the author's intent matters, how the poem is read is what creates the meaning, and Siken’s feelings towards this allows for readers to make assumptions and project onto his work. Applying this to Little Beast creates room for many readings and interpretations.

In this first section of the poem Siken writes, “Tonight, by the freeway, a man eating a fruit pie with a buckknife carves the likeness of his lover’s face into a motel wall. I like him, and I want to be like him, my hands no longer an afterthought.”. The narrator seems uncomfortable in his own body, he doesn’t know what to do with himself, his hands specifically. The narrator also appears to be envious, not just of his knowledge of what to do with his hands, but also of the passion, obsession, he feels for someone else.

The third section, in its entirety reads, “History repeats itself. Somebody says this. History throws its shadow over the beginning, over the desktop, over the sock drawer with its socks, its hidden letters. History is a little man in a brown suit trying to define a room he is outside of. I know history. There are many names in history but none of them are ours.”. The speaker makes history seem like this inescapable thing, it’s always there. History is something

that will haunt the future, despite the fact that it has not yet happened. The speaker defines history as proof that he knows it, only to then go on to make the claim that their names are not in history. This could be for multiple reasons. One being that the speaker does not believe that the relationship between the two is important enough to be in history, as many people who are remembered are people who have done ‘valuable’ things, like be kings or presidents or fight in wars. Another reason may be the fact that they are not in history because they are the first to experience such a thing, or maybe it’s the speaker's first time in just his own life. Either way, it’s not a part of history which is notable to the speaker.

In the fourth section Siken writes, “He had green eyes, so I wanted to sleep with him-- green eyes flecked with yellow, dried leaves on the surface of a pool- You could drown in those eyes, I said.”. Later in the section he writes, “You could drown in those eyes, I said, so it’s summer, so it’s suicide, so we’re helpless in sleep and struggling at the bottom of the pool.”. These two lines are obviously connected, one being placed at the beginning of the section and the other being at the very end. The progression between the two seems natural almost, the first quote seems to be the noticing of the subject, a confession. The second quote reads more as the speaker giving into his desires, using it being summer as an excuse. The metaphor of the pool and the reference of “drowning” in the subject's eyes is also very important. The first reference of drowning appears to be in the traditionally romantic sense, more similar to ‘getting lost’ in someone's eyes. The second, however, seems to be more in the literal sense. He begins to feel the crushing, suffocating, feeling and seems to have the knowledge that this relationship will not end well.

In the fifth section Siken writes, “Mirrors and shop windows returned our faces to us, replete with the tight lips and eyes that remained eyes and not the doorways we had hoped for.”

This line can be associated with the saying, ‘eyes are the windows to the soul’. Rather than the speaker looking into his partner's eyes and seeing who he really is and all the things he didn’t know about the subject, the narrator just sees eyes. The beginning of the quote feels as though in this relationship the narrator lost his sense of self, and as the relationship began to fall apart in a sense the narrator begins to remember who he is. Later in the section it says, “His wounds healed, the skin a bit thicker than before, scars like train tracks on his arms and on his body underneath his shirt.”. This could be literal, perhaps the subject injured himself, the reference to the scars looking like train tracks could be an allusion to self-harm on the part of the subject. However, it could also be metaphorical, or a less physical version of self-harm. Maybe the subject knows the relationship is toxic, yet stays in the relationship. Or perhaps the narrator is hurting the subject in some sense, and he is now stronger than he was before because of it.

In the sixth section Siken writes, “We still groped for each other on the backstairs or in parked cars as the roads around us grew glossy with ice and our breath softened the view through a glass already laced with frost, but more frequently I was finding myself sleepless, and he was running out of lullabies. But damn if there isn’t anything sexier than a slender boy with a handgun, a fast car, a bottle of pills.” The narrator appears to be losing interest in his partner, or is at the very minimum no longer finding comfort in his relationship with him, however he is still attracted to the subject so he remains in the relationship with him. The reference to the cold also could be a comparison to their relationship, the feelings towards each other have grown cold yet the physical intimacy between the two allows some ‘heat’ to remain. This changing of seasons is also a good comparison to the reference of summer in the fourth section. While the weather was warmer their relationship was new and ‘hotter’ amd as they’re together the heat dies down and so do their feelings for each other.

The final section, which was previously mentioned with the quote, “Sorry about the blood in your mouth. I wish it was mine.”. This quote is not the only one in this section that stands out, one of them being, “Try explaining a life bundled with episodes of this– swallowing mud, swallowing glass, the smell of blood on the first four knuckles.” This, to me, reads as the acceptance of the end. The speaker admits that he does not want to live a life where he feels as though he is constantly fighting, swallowing glass rather than saying what he wants to say. The final sentence of the poem reads, “I couldn’t get the boy to kill me, but I wore his jacket for the longest time.”. The relationship has ended at this point, he couldn’t stay in the relationship long enough for its toxicity to kill him, but he recalls having a part of the subject for a period of his life. The speaker was so obsessed with the subject that he wanted him to kill him, and yet he couldn’t make it happen.

Siken’s writing, while the language seems to be very straight forward, requires a lot of interpretation. He himself said in an interview with The Adroit Journal, “The more frank they are, the more mysterious they have to be.”

Richard Siken, as a poet, uses a lot of imagery and metaphors to write about the obsession that comes with wanting someone. He uses themes of violence and the general feeling of being uncomfortable to build on this intense tone of his work, and in his poem Little Beast this is very clear. He wants his writing to be interpreted and perceived in a way that is personal to the reader, which creates a powerful attachment from the community.

“I’m just a writer. I write things down. I walk through your dreams and invent the future” -Richard Siken, Litany in Which Certain Things Are Crossed Out

[existentialmagazine]

Review: Embracing solitude in the Holiday season, Magz new pop anthem ‘Alone For Christmas’ delivers catchy sound and empowering words

Independent singer, songwriter, and producer Magz reigns from within New York City, boasting an incredible 20,000 monthly Spotify listeners since her 2020 musical beginnings. Now entering the Holiday season with a bang, Magz shares the all-too-relatable ‘Alone For Christmas.’

Setting up the Christmas spirit early, ‘Alone For Christmas’ offers the perfect dreamy pop combination of twinkling magic and anthemic lyrics you’ll be singing along to any time of the year. Whimsical and bright right from the start, ‘Alone For Christmas’ dazzles in vibrant instrumental chimes and hazy undertones of drawn-out synth, painting the picture of winter’s snowy skies and captivating spirits from hanging lights to love-filled Christmas movies. This enchantment carries through into the opening verse as softly padding beats join into the gentle concoction of sounds, all the while Magz vocals soar through the agile vastness of the soundscape, airily cascading into higher tones with an undercurrent of melancholia seeping through. Deep piano keys add to this saddened feel, reverberating through the pre-chorus, seemingly also fading out of the initial chimes’ and their more ethereal qualities for a moment more paired-back and sentimentally confiding. The chorus merges both of these senses into one, finding a sense of solace in what others may deem to be a negative, clasping around what sounds like tambourine rattles, elegant drum beats, rich piano and Christmassy bells and chimes. Magz floaty words only further add to the comforting warmth of the sound, melting your freezing heart with her two and a half minute embrace. As things push forward, the instruments of ‘Alone For Christmas’ only continue to build in their strength and interlacing tones, along with a multitude of backing vocal layers that shimmer with a haunting encapsulation of the entire single’s resonance.

As many of us perhaps experienced due to COVID or just due to the world’s rise in loneliness, Magz pens a narrative of the holiday season spent alone inside of ‘Alone For Christmas’ for everyone everywhere to relate to. From the opening line’s change in perception, ‘some shiny things aren’t so shiny anymore’, it’s immediately established that Christmas doesn’t have quite the same glow as it once did in youth and over-sensationalised media. Continuing ‘this season doesn’t look the same as it did before’ , there’s an evident shift in opinion and appreciation for what this holiday truly means, no longer relying upon traditions and surrounding yourself with others to be happy. The chorus hook pushes this narrative front and centre, beaming ‘you’d think I’d be writing a wishlist, but all I really need is me’ , a declaration of self-love that we could all do with taking on as we learn to navigate life’s more solitude moments. As this evidently isn’t her first time spending this time by herself, Magz lines like ‘looks like it’s another year alone for Christmas’ look to find positives in what was likely once hard to bear, turning this event into a celebration of her own. Though so much of the track is doused in this uplifting sentiment, there are nods like ‘I’ll be playing blues instead of jingle bells’ that seemingly still carry some sadness for the loss of family and loved ones for Magz to surround herself with, burying a lot of these emotions as she navigates it with strength and her own gratitude for what the experience has to give her alone. There’s a definite sorrow between the lines but that is to be expected as the world promotes grand parties and get-togethers, with Magz instead focusing upon all the casual magic and beauty that can be found through cherishing such an occasion in the company of just yourself.

Check out ‘Alone For Christmas’ for yourself here to find some reassurance in spending the holiday season alone this year, or just to play it loud and have a jolly good time!

Written by: Tatiana Whybrow

Photo Credits: Unknown

// This coverage was supported and created via Musosoup, #SustainableCurator.

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